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Isolation Vs. Companionship In A Short Story

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Liam Vickers September 17, 2015 Short Story Essay Isolation Vs Companionship In the stories “A&P” and “The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty”, the main theme in the first two paragraphs are isolation opposed to companionship. “A&P” written by John Updike, is a story about the narrator, Sammy, falling in love with two girls who enter the shopping centre that he works in as a cashier. He wants to be apart of Queenie’s (one of the girl's) life, and is never given the chance when his boss, Lengel, makes the girls leave leading to the end of the story where Sammy quits his job. In the story “The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty” by James Thurber, it is about a man named Walter Mitty, who drifts in and out of reality and day dreaming. …show more content…

He also has a small daydream which tells leads him to believe what it could be like if he was with her. The daydream shows the reader what her life is like currently and I quote “All of a sudden I slid right down her voice into her living room. Her father and the other men were standing around in ice-cream coats and bow ties and the women were in sandals picking up herring snacks on toothpicks off a big glass plate and they were all holding drinks the color of water with olives and sprigs of mint in them”, and then it tells us about what his life is like “When my parents have somebody over they get lemonade and if it’s a real racy affair Schlitz in tall glasses with “They’ll Do It Every Time” cartoons stencilled on”, this shows the reader what his life is like and what he thinks what class he would be in if he was with Queenie, which shows us the theme of companionship. The chance of companionship is immediately pulled away when the group of girls are kicked out of the store by Lengel, leaving Sammy in isolation. During the middle of the story “The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty”, Walter Mitty dreams of going into trial as the defendant and everyone knows him and he knows most people, making him think …show more content…

Once Sammy has quit his job, he leaves the store and goes outside hoping for companionship by finding Queenie outside waiting for him, or at least seeing her in the distance. However, once again pushed back into isolation, all he finds is a older mother arguing with her children about some candy in a window, making him feel isolated. At the ending of “The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty”, the differences between isolation and companionship are show to us once again. It is shown when we think he has given in to isolation by letting his wife once again pull Walter Mitty around, but he then starts day dreaming once again, showing us that he thinks everyone knows him and that he is “undefeatable” by lining up and thinking that he is standing in front of a firing squad, hoping that he has found companionship in

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